The Health Insurance Portability and Accountability Act (HIPAA) of 1996 was a piece of legislation that stands as one of the most important changes in American health care in the modern age. Among other changes, HIPAA completely revolutionized the way that health care-related information is protected in connection with the privacy and confidentiality of patient interests. Under the HIPAA, most of the information furnished by patients or generated by health care providers is deemed to be protected health information (PHI). All such information is strictly protected from unauthorized sharing and disclosure by rules that, since 2003 (generally), require all organizations and entities handling such information to adopt very specific procedures for ensuring that it is properly safeguarded and protected against breaches of the patient's statutory right of confidentiality of all protected information.

The implementation of HIPAA has changed the way that health care providers practice because it imposes strict rules about the collection, maintenance, and disclosure of PHI. Those changes include the establishment of comprehensive rules requiring all health care provider entities to hire or designate health information officers and to provide regular training to all staff (both paid and unpaid) who might come into contact with PHI during the course of their professional duties. The Act prescribes substantial monetary fines for inadvertent violations and penal sentences for repeated or deliberate HIPAA violations. Naturally, all health care providers and entities with access to PHI had to radically change their business operations to comply with HIPAA policies after 2003.

2. Health Care Reform Act of 2010

The Health Care Reform Act of 2010 was the first comprehensive piece of legislation passed by Congress to address many of the systemic problems in the American health care system. Some of the more significant changes attributable to the legislation were that it: (1) increased the availability of health insurance; (2) prohibited health insurance companies from withdrawing coverage or denying coverage in many situations; (3) provided tax credits to small businesses to encourage them to offer health insurance; (4) increased funds for seniors for prescription drugs; (5) limited the amount of profit that health insurance companies may retain by mandating that 80% of premium income must be spent on services; (6) increased certain Medicare payroll taxes; (7) required individuals to obtain health care insurance; and (7) provided subsidies to assist Americans afford health insurance. This artifact is crucial to any genuine understanding of the American healthcare system after 2010.

On February 24, 2010, then Representative Anthony Weiner (D-NY) lambasted his republican colleagues in a courageous and historic speech on the floor of the House of Representatives. He described the Republican party as a "wholly owned subsidiary of an insurance industry," a reference to the inexcusable relationship that existed between elected political representatives in charge of national legislative policy and the thousands of Washington lobbyists paid for by the for-profit private health insurance industry. That speech highlighted the truth of the principal reasons that American healthcare ballooned in costs in the preceding decades and called for reform in the lobbying of Congress by private industry. Understanding that dynamic is also crucial to all health…
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